Anita Rani to Receive Special Contribution Award at Travel Media Awards 2026: Celebrated broadcaster, author and UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador Anita Rani is set to receive the Special Contribution Award at the Travel Media Awards 2026, recognising her outstanding contribution to travel storytelling across television, radio, podcasts and print.
The award will be presented at a prestigious ceremony at The Savoy in London on Monday, 26 October 2026. Judges were unanimous in selecting Rani for the honour, which celebrates an individual who has made a significant impact on travel storytelling.
Rani is one of Britain’s best-known broadcasters, with millions of listeners and viewers familiar with her work on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, which she presents every Thursday and Friday, and BBC One’s Countryfile, which she has fronted for more than a decade.
Her travel credentials were further highlighted in 2025 when she appeared in Celebrity Race Across the World, travelling alongside her father, Bal, through the Caribbean and Colombia. The experience gave audiences a more personal insight into Rani’s relationship with travel and her family.
Travel has remained a major thread throughout Rani’s career. As an ambassador for Discover the World, she has reported from destinations including Iceland, the Arctic and Costa Rica. Her humanitarian work has also taken her overseas, including to Kyrgyzstan, where she met stateless families in her role as a UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador.
Rani also narrated Forced to Flee, a podcast told entirely through the voices of displaced people. The production subsequently won a Webby Award, further demonstrating her ability to combine travel, human stories and social issues.
Beyond broadcasting, Rani serves as Chancellor of the University of Bradford and is the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Right Sort of Girl.
Her growing digital presence has added another dimension to her storytelling. In 2025, she launched her YouTube channel, ItsAnitaRani, followed in 2026 by Sisters of Defiance, a video and audio podcast celebrating extraordinary women and exploring the stories behind their achievements.
The first season featured prominent guests including Dame Meera Syal, Emma Grede, Gisèle Pelicot, Beverley Knight and Anoushka Shankar. The podcast reached number one in two Apple podcast categories and was named among The Guardian’s Best Podcasts of 2026 So Far. A second season is scheduled to return later this year.
Speaking about the award and her relationship with travel, Rani said that travel “broadens your horizons, opens your mind and humbles you”, adding that experiencing different cultures, landscapes, food and people’s stories demonstrates both the diversity of the world and the commonality of humanity.
Anthony Leyens, Chairman of APL Media, praised Rani’s contribution, saying she has brought people, places and cultures to life through her broadcasting, writing and humanitarian work “with warmth, intelligence and curiosity.”
The Travel Media Awards 2026, held in association with Aspire Pre-flight Hospitality, will bring together leading figures from the travel and media industries. The event will also recognise winners across a range of national and international travel journalism categories, selected from hundreds of submissions.
Tickets are now on sale, with early-bird tickets priced at £125 until 22 September, increasing to £150 from 23 September. The official shortlist is scheduled to be announced on 9 September 2026.
The awards are sponsored by organisations and brands including Battersea Power Station, easyJet holidays, Holafly, Intrepid Travel, Marella Cruises, Mail Metro Media, Nova Scotia, Princess Cruises, Sky Media, Switzerland Tourism, The Independent, The Telegraph, TUI, Visit Cyprus and Visit Jersey.
The Special Contribution Award will provide one of the evening’s key moments as the travel media community comes together to celebrate Anita Rani’s distinctive contribution to travel storytelling and her work connecting audiences with people, cultures and places around the world.
